K, I know this issue has been around for a while but it was mentioned on the National last night so it I thought rehash it again.

Why can’t the CRTC get it through their heads that nobody other than special interest groups want the CRTC messing with their internet service. Besides, Canadian content on the internet seems to be alive and well to me, case in point, CKA. What’s next, the HRC screening all of our sights to ensure no one is offended (err… I guess that’s all ready happening)?

Nanny-state mandarins seek to justify their jobs

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission -- the federal regulatory body that protects us from ourselves -- says it may start regulating the Internet.

The pointy-headed bureaucrats at the CRTC are musing about the possibility of trying to impose Canadian content rules on the movies and videos we watch online.

And they're holding public hearings on it to see what Canadians think.

Amazing.

Do these nanny-state mandarins have nothing better to do with their time than to dream up new ways of trying to justify their jobs?

It's bad enough taxpayers pay for an empire of regulators who feel it's their lot in life to tell Canadians what to think, what to watch on TV and what to listen to on the radio.

Now they want to dunk their cultural dipsticks into the deep, murky world of cyberspace, too?

Good grief.

Naturally, this is all in the name of protecting Canadian culture, CRTC supporters say. Apparently too many Seinfeld and Friends re-runs are the trans fats of a good Canadian cultural diet, whether on TV or online. And federal regulators want to make sure we're not getting too much of it. A little is OK. But consumed in excess it tears at the digestive walls of Canadianism and can contribute to an epidemic of cultural obesity.

Just imagine what back-to-back Sunday NFL match-ups, copious amounts of American Idol and marathon viewings of Survivor episodes could do to our cultural fabric if it wasn't for our federal regulators.

Losing market share

Without the CRTC, golly, we wouldn't be able tell the difference between Don Cherry and Uncle Sam.

Goodness knows without a steady diet of Corner Gas and Road to Avonlea, the average Canadian would morph into a cola-guzzling, pseudo-American consumer ready to ditch his Glass Tiger memorabilia in favour of a repackaged Bruce Springsteen box set.

The horror.

Naturally, the only reason the CRTC wants to move into the Internet medium is because they're losing market share. They're a government business with layers of bureaucracy and lots of well-paid jobs that does not want to become obsolete. They want to keep their paycheques, maintain their empire and protect whatever relevance they think they have in protecting Canadian culture.

The good news is the CRTC will not be able to regulate the Internet any more than a man can have a baby -- or make money hosting the Olympic Games.

They may be able to bully a few federally regulated TV and radio broadcasters into injecting more Canuck content into their Internet products. Even then, it's beyond me how they could possibly set minimum content rules for something as vast and multi-tentacled as an Internet site.

Whatever the case, they won't be able to lay a finger on the vast majority of Internet content, an ever-changing ocean of sites that will simply not allow itself to be regulated.

By trying to interfere online, all the CRTC would do is create a uneven playing field between the small number of mainstream players they might be able to influence and the vast majority of elusive ones they won't be able to get their hands on.

Frankly, I doubt this nonsense is going to amount to much.

The CRTC is wasting tax dollars holding hearings on whether they should regulate something they simply can't control.

At the end of the day they will likely conclude there's very little, if anything, they can do to expand their business into the Internet industry.

You just can't force people to watch Littlest Hobo re-runs online. It doesn't work.